Where does meaning come from Exploring how people rely on culture to express meaning in mergers

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Where does meaning come from? Exploring how
people rely on culture to express meaning in
mergers
Karen Golden-Biddle May Meaning
Meeting University of Illinois 2006

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Today

• Context of health care in Alberta, Canada
• 5-year study of organizational change
• My (re)emerging interest in culture
• Examine meetings as cultural object to see
  stories and meanings they express

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Health care organization in Canada

• Publicly funded provincial responsibility
• RHAs in Alberta since 1994
• All medically necessary services delivered
  through RHAs (except physician services)
• In Alberta, 9 RHAs serving 3 million people

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Some emerging ideas about culture

• Where does meaning come from?
• Not from founder or individual genius or
  passive transmission through history.
• But from collective creation of individuals in
  everyday interaction
• Culture as fundamentally an expressive aspect of
  our human lives
• Significance (not practicality function)
• Individuals rely on culture to express meaning in
  their lives here in merging experience.

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Meetings as cultural object in merging

• Cultural object
• Shared meaning embodied in some form (audible,
  visible, etc)
• Tells a story what does object express?
• In merger, for region entering larger entity,
  loss of cultural objects related to explicit
  identity (logo, headquarters location, name)
  associated with strong community basis.
• On everyday basis, saw people expressing meaning
  in mergers via cultural object of meetings.
• Meetings as central forum for discussing merging
  interacting with unfamiliar as well as familiar
  people forming new organization

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Meetings as cultural object in merging

• Getting to know, understand and trust one another
  in meetings
• I think its the trust you have to establish. You
  have to establish that trust with people and you
  also have to let people know what skills you
  have.Everyone feels a little protective of their
  role and whether theyre going to be needed or
  wanted I remember back when we did merge that
  first time, we had to make sure that everyone
  knew each other and everyone understood each
  other, and respected people for their skills and
  not isolated themselves in their old
  stovepipesWe had lots of meetings where we could
  feedback and communicate, get to know one
  another

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Meetings as cultural object in merging

• Getting to know, understand and trust one another
  in meetings
• Everything had to be a meeting, it had to be
  you know, if we wanted to develop that trust. And
  it went quicker than you know after we trusted
  one another, we went to just sharing and .
• If we were going to make a change in policy that
  affected the hospital and us, we met together. We
  sat down together at a meeting Id be sitting
  down with every manager in the Region, not just
  those in your sectors. You know, everybody was
  sitting there so you could address issues.

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Meetings as cultural object in merging

• No longer being at the table
• but to sit around with a group of leaders and
  talk about the political climate, strategizing
  for the future, that kind of think, I miss that a
  great deal.

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Meetings as cultural object in merging

• The table is no longer where its at
• The directors group could be a pretty key group.
  I havent been able to get to enough meetings to
  see how key it could be, but you know, if it was
  allowed to be, it could be a very strong group.
  Like our former Crossroads management team was,
  where you could bring issues forward and discuss
  them. But you really need to have somebody from
  the corporate level there because otherwise all
  they do is just redirect you to your VP, you see.
  So, if you bring forward like staff wellness
  they just nobody will commit to anything. They
  just redirect you to your VP. Even before the
  merger I get the feeling that they never did have
  a management team set up like we had where you
  had your CEO and your VPs and then managers and
  directors all meeting together on a monthly basis
  to talk about issues.

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Meetings as cultural object in merging

• The table is no longer where its at
• There isnt that kind of participatory meetings
  and so consequently, what I see is that people at
  staff level of middle management level narrowing
  focus.
• Here, there are a few instances of meetings where
  there might be some cross networking going on,
  but it feels exceedingly undirectedlike nobodys
  really sure about what they should be doing

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Meetings as cultural object in merging

• Re-creating meetings as participatory
• The way Ive been trying to do it is, since I am
  operating a new area, we had to develop new roles
  and responsibilities and procedures. I met with
  every Program Manager and Director across the
  region. I had meetings with them, looking at what
  they chould see our area doing. Then when I
  developed the roles and structre, I again sent it
  out to all of them. I presented it at one, two
  three, four committees, If I would have just
  tried to writ ethe policies myself, without
  interacting with all of those people and trying
  to get their feedback on what this area could do
  for htem, I dont think it would have been
  approved. So I think that s part of the
  challenges in merging its trying to develop
  that trust and then get people to accept
  innovation and change. There isnt that kind of
  participatory meetings and so consequently, what
  I see is that people at staff level of middle
  management level narrowing focus.

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Meetings as cultural object in merging

• Re-creating meetings as participatory
• Before we had office meetings on a monthly basis
  with one of the Managers always there, and it was
  all of the staff in the office. It was not to
  talk program issues, but whos cleaning out the
  kitchen and you know, what needs to be repaired.
  And just to let you know our program is putting
  this on in case you want to be involvedall kinds
  of issues like that. After the merger, we were
  told not to have those meetings anymore. We have,
  finally, gotten permission to re-institute these
  meetings. They make a big difference and at those
  meetings now, we are spending some time doing
  what we used to do those type things which is
  talking about naming the losses in merging,
  talking about change, how do you feel now, are
  there things that we could be doing differently
  to help you through this process

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Discussion

• Your ideas, reactions ..